SOCIAL SMOKING CAMPAIGN by BBDO Toronto, Proximity Toronto for Ontario Ministry Of Health And Long-term Care

The Promo / PR Ad titled SOCIAL SMOKING CAMPAIGN was done by BBDO Toronto, Proximity Toronto advertising agencies for Ontario Ministry Of Health And Long-term Care in Canada. It was released in Dec 2012.

Strategy
The government of Ontario decided they could save tons of lives and health care money if they could get social smokers to quit before they got addicted. Their objective was to reduce tobacco use in Ontario to the lowest rate in Canada – from 19.4% to 15.7%, or 416,077 fewer smokers. Our target was occasional or “Social Smokers” between the ages of 18-29 who represent approximately 600,000 smokers in Ontario. But how do you convince someone to stop doing something they won’t even admit they do? They hide behind the term “Social Smoker”; they don’t even think they smoke. Strangely, no anti-smoking campaign had ever tackled this key intervention moment, although it makes sense, as over 60% of social smokers eventually become smokers. Our campaign took away their social safe place by using humorous analogies to show how ridiculous using the word “social” to justify smoking really was.

Effectiveness
Within 2 weeks, we earned 117 million impressions, 2 million YouTube views and over 141,000 engagements. More importantly, we got people talking, increasing the conversation around social smoking by more than 8,600%. The campaign’s fresh approach was recognized in Ad Week, Ad Age’s Best Creative of the Day, Ads of the World, Mashable, Time Magazine, and The Huffington Post. CNN even called it “Maybe the best PSA ever.” Other interested parties, like Canada’s Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, joined the discussion, volunteering their time and expertise. In short, we quickly created a robust discussion around the issue of “Social smoking”.

Execution
This campaign was social by nature – all communications drove to our Facebook page at quitthedenial.com. Paid media that drove to Facebook included cinema ads, online advertising, on campus posters and ads in restaurants and bars. Given our youthful target, leveraging social media was a natural choice for this campaign. Since peer groups wield such influence with this audience, we needed a forum where they could interact with one another, voice their opinions, and start a conversation no one was having. In addition to our social platform, we planned to intersect “social smokers” where and when they were most likely to light up. “Social smokers” typically choose to smoke on weekends when they’re out with their friends. By having a presence at weekend haunts like movies and bars we hoped to intersect “Social smokers” in the moment and have them reconsider their actions.